Podcasts are nothing new. You probably have one or two you listen to or watch on a regular basis yourself but have you ever considered creating one? It’s not as difficult as you might think. In fact, it’s incredibly easy! If you are a blogger or content producer of a video/multimedia blog, having a podcast just makes sense.
Why turn away the opportunity to reach anyone and everyone who has access to iTunes?! I mean, do you even know someone who doesn’t? We’re talking about opening your audience up to millions upon millions of NEW viewers and listeners. Got your attention yet? I thought so 😉
Steps to turn blogs into a podcast episode
1. Create an audio or video file (mp3 or mp4)
2. Upload that file to a server. You can use whatever server you are hosting your WordPress blog on. Do not try to upload the file using the media button you might normally use while creating posts.
3. Link to the file in a post on your blog. If you normally video blog via youtube or vimeo for example or sound cloud for audio, you will want to include a link below that embedded media to your hosted video or audio file. That embedded media will not be accessible in iTunes.
4. With that link included in your post, wordpress automatically adds it to your RSS/Atom feed, which is what iTunes uses to pull your podcast content from.
5. Test your RSS/Atom link by opening iTunes>going to Advanced Menu>Select Subscribe to Podcast>paste your RSS/Atom link into the text box>click ok. Next to your new podcast subscription section in iTunes you should see the name of your RSS/Atom feed appear with an orange circle next to it. This circle indicates that iTunes is downloading your podcast content via the feed link. When that circle disappears you should be able to click on the title and view the content iTunes has downloaded.
6. Now it’s time to submit your podcast to iTunes. Open the iTunes store>click on podcasts in the top nav bar>in the right column on the podcast page, click the links titled submit a podcast>follow the instructions listed to finalize.
Note: you will need to have a valid iTunes account and be logged into iTunes while attempting this.
For more in-depth instruction and/or tips:
Plugin Podcasting options include:
Buzzsprout Podcasting (recommended for audio users)
